Barry's the fastest man alive but its Hal Jordan the Green Lantern who reacts first. A green hand appears and slams Rip Hunter into the wall.
Kendra Saunders the Hawkgirl is a warrior, more than just physically but also emotionally, her first instinct is to move by Barry. Seeing another you dead just a few feet away is traumatic but she's there for him.
Oliver Queen the Green Arrow, Hal jokes they have so much green in the team, he's considered the weakest member of the team, but his brain makes him dangerous as I can see already that he's forming a plan or an explanation to what must be happening.
I have many names but the name I go by now is Carter Hall and I am the Hawkman.
"Hal!" I say to get his attention, but he can't or refuses to hear me. We all love Barry, but Hal is closer to Barry than he is Oliver or maybe even Kendra.
"What the hell did you do?" Hal demands.
Rip Hunter, a self-proclaimed time lord, he supposedly defends our world from time aberrations. "I had to stop him."
"Me?" Our Barry asks unsure still staring at his dead double.
Oliver uses his gruff voice as he focuses an arrow at the time traveler, "you got one minute to explain what you're saying."
"If we don't like it, you're dead." Hal added.
Rip grunted as the green hand tightened around him.
"Hal stop it now!" Hawkgirl finally intervened verbally but remained by Barry's side.
"He…" Hal was about to argue but was stopped as the second Barry Allen began to fade into blue and white light.
"I made it in time." Sighs Rip.
"What?" asks Hawkman his eyebrow perking up. Rip noticed Hawkman and then Hawkgirl and shook his head.
"We should take this off the street." Hawkman decided as he noticed the sound of incoming police sirens for the royal flush gang, and the few phones peeking out from some windows.
"I'll hold him." Said Hal as he floated off. Green Arrow moved over to the immobile Flash and gives him a pep talk. I would stay and offer my own condolences or promises that he wouldn't be harmed but someone had to make sure Hal didn't harm Rip.
We flew/ran Rip Hunter to our base, an airplane hanger used by Ferris Airlines now renovated into our hall of Justice. Oberon, a former ringmaster, who assisted us with an important kidnapping case that involved people from the second dimension, became a manager of the team letting us know of threats that required our attention while also being a spoke person to the press.
Oberon greeted us at the entrance of the Hall.
"I saw you guys take down the Royal F…" but became quiet at the sight of the bounded Rip Hunter. "I heard there was something weird was going down as well and I assume there's a good reason Rip is bound."
Hal didn't say much as he moved Rip through the hall to one of our interrogation rooms.
"Hopefully Rip will explain himself soon and as soon as we know you'll know." I said to Oberon as apology and explanation for Hal's rude behavior. "Do you know who Rip Hunter is?"
"I've been compiling all your individual and team cases for our JL Computers, so I damn sure know who Rip Hunter is." Oberon grumbled.
Oberon rubbed his forehead, "Rip Hunter is a time-traveling superhero from the future who works to ensure the safety of the timestream. His origins and true name are a closely guarded secret to protect him from time-traveling enemies."
"And that's all we know except for the few times he helped each of you individually with a problem."
Hawkman nodded his head, of course that's all their collected info would have on the time traveler. They wouldn't know how Rip Hunter had helped me and my friends when we called ourselves the Justice Society of America. It haunts me since I visited my old friend Jay Garrick. Should I tell my current team about a secret legacy that we're upholding?
"You okay there Hawkman?" Oberon asked.
"Yeah I'm fine the sooner we sort this mess the better." I say before turning and heading to the interrogation room.
The group sat in their respective chairs with Rip leaning up against the wall tied up in ropes.
"why did you kill the Flash?" demanded Green Lantern.
"Green Lantern!" Shouted Hawkgirl, Green Lantern glared at Hawkgirl before turning back to Rip.
"Did you kill Flash?" asked Hawkgirl "and why?"
Rip sighed, "I did kill… 'A' Flash." He admitted. Flash looked at Rip, swallowed and looked down at his hands. It was one thing to know you're going to die but know how and by who, was another matter on itself.
"You sonuvabitch!" growled Green lantern.
"Can you not control yourself." I demanded sick of his outbursts. Green Lantern whirled on me.
"How the hell can you be so calm."
I swallowed before speaking, "Because I trust Rip, he's never given me a reason not to trust him so…"
"He's given me plenty of reason not to trust him." Growled Green Arrow. I look at Oliver and can see there's some major hatred.
"I'm sorry, Oliver."
"What did he…" began Flash but quickly shuts his mouth, as Green Arrow began grinding his teeth.
"He knew Black Canary the first one was gonna die and did nothing but watch." Green Arrow growled, "and when I asked for his help to prevent Ra's attack, the attack that brought us all together*, he once again did nothing."
"Oliver, I couldn't. Sarah's death was important to the timeline, and if I helped with the Ra's attack the Justice League would never have formed."
"Bullshit." Said Green Arrow.
"Everyone just shut up, okay." Said Flash. Everyone and I looked at Barry in shock.
"I- I want to know why you did it, Rip."
Rip sighed deeply, "it's a long story, Barry but…" he looked at us all in turn, "Something bad is coming because…Flash…I…. we, Barry and I fucked up the timeline creating an end to time." Rip Hunter told us about the dark future that was six years away. He told us how Vandal Savage and Brother Eye came up with a plan to save our universe, but Barry had… attempted to fix things the old-fashioned way. Rip had no choice but to use lethal force to stop the other Barry but in that timestream to our present he saw something.
"What was it?" asked Barry slowly.
"We saved the universe, but we might have just saved it for an even worse fate." Rip said.
"Who was it?" I asked. Maybe I encountered this evil in my five thousand years of life.
Rip shrugged his shoulders.
"We need answers Rip, I swear to god if you're purposely holding…" ranted Green Arrow.
"I swear on my real name that I'm telling the truth Oliver, whoever this thing is I don't think its from our universe or timeline and without my time sphere I will never know."
"What should we do then?" asks Hawkgirl.
"We do what we always do." Responds Hawkman after a few moments of quiet. The heroes looked at their leader as he continued. "We protect the world from any and all threats, from the streets, to the skies, and the planets beyond."